Distracted
by hp4freek
Summary: Molly Weasley goes shopping with far too many young children in tow. However will she keep up with them all? This is an older story that I wrote on the prompt of a fic that involves someone losing something.


Molly Weasley was getting her son Bill ready to attend his second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Her and the children (there were seven total) were all shopping in Diagon Alley, the only proper place to purchase everything that he would need.

She wasn't sure she would ever be able to forgive Arthur, her husband of several years, for not getting time off from work to help out with this mess. The crowds were bad enough, but the children…

The screaming was unbearable. Must they always scream like that? Molly wanted to scream, too.

Bill was the only one of her children actually old enough to attend school yet. She could already tell each of their personalities, though. Bill was studious, and a bit of a charmer. Charlie was the athlete, though most of her children already showed an interest in Quidditch. Percy was… well, Percy was really the annoying one. She wanted to chastise herself for even thinking that way, but at seven, the boy already got on her nerves. He was also very intelligent, though. Then there was Fred and George. Oh, Fred and George were identical twins who showed an interest in any and all things mischievous. They were the jokesters. Ron was still young; he was only three, but already he did everything his older brothers did. He was the only one she really couldn't read, beyond being a follower. Ginny. She smiled when she thought of Ginny. She was very proud to have produced the first girl the Weasley's had seen in several generations. Ginny was quiet and shy, and nothing like her other children.

It felt like it had been days since she had first heralded her children through the arch leading to the shops, when it had truthfully only been an hour or two ago. The way Bill was growing was outrageous. He was already tall and lanky, like his father, but it seemed he was shooting up a couple inches a month. She mentally reminded herself that at least his old robes and uniform could be passed down to Charlie in another year or so.

She set Ginny down and told her other children to wait there while she spoke with Madam Malkin about Bill's robes. By the time she was ready to go again, she was exhausted. Madam Malkin, at least, had understood about the screaming and gave her several reassuring smiles as she measured Bill.

Voluminous bags in hand, she called to her children, who of course had refused to stay seated, quiet, or in one place, and they left. They were now off to Flourish and Blotts for schoolbooks.

With new robes and schoolbooks, Molly gathered her children one more time. She apologized profusely to the owner, hoping he wouldn't make her personally pay for the pages that Fred and George had torn out of those books.

She was still thanking Merlin that Bill's hat and gloves at least still fit, and that his previous equipment for Potions and Astronomy still worked, by the time she finally made it home. Sending six small children through a floo had been a nightmare in and of itself.

Six?

Molly dropped the bags as soon as she stopped spinning in the grate.

"Everyone in here. Now!" The children had all gone their separate ways as soon as they had made it through. Downheartedly, they all came back, each hoping they weren't the ones in trouble.

She counted them. She counted them again. She looked and looked, finally asking, "Where's Ginny?"

They each looked from one another, finally noticing their little sister missing. Molly was hysterical, pacing, trying to think where she had seen the girl last. Just then, she heard the grate whoosh and rushed into the living room just in time to see Arthur stop spinning. In his arms was an ecstatic Ginny.

"Oh, thank goodness, dear. Wherever did you find her? I've been worried sick. I just couldn't leave the children here to go look. I didn't know…"

"Shhh… Molly. It's okay. Madam Malkin owled me at the Ministry to tell me that she'd been left and that she couldn't get a hold of you. I rushed right over, and now we're here. And she's just fine. She's been playing all afternoon."

Molly was so relieved, she rushed up to hug her. She vowed to never let Arthur get out of the shopping again.


End file.
